Saturday, 29 December 2007

So, it's been a long, tiring, and adventurous journey, but it's finally come to a rather quick ending!

Ranger finally hit 75 yesterday, on Trolls none the less! (PUP hit 75 on Mamool - maybe my next job will ding on Undead Swarm?) In any case, I levelled it to 67! Since I got the Kraken for DRK and recently returned, I ran full force to 75, even if I took my time to explore WoG throughout. Most of my exp, from 69-72 was from Campaign. I would lfg for 2 or 3 hours and make 15k just guarding my two favourite areas, Jugner, and Vunkerl Inlet. It's great fun, and I'm all caught up in my current missions/Maws.

Gear! The only piece that was a bitch to get were these. Most of my gear crosses over from DRK (Prudence Torque, since I'm going a Gun/Kraken Build, Rajas, Flame Ring, turban, etc) and PUP (P.Body, P.Legs, Brutal Earring, etc). I still need a few mouth watering things like Denali jacket and perhaps Osode, but they can wait. I'm happy with gear I already own for my other jobs, and my little Hellfire+1. It's great fun!

Swiftly after hitting 75, I managed to unlock these two WSs. Thanks to Mizuko, Sazaku, Positron, and Stac for helping break latent and take down the teeny little NMs. (BUT NOT BEET LEAFHOPPER, HE WAS A HORRIBLE ONE /WRISTS) Picture related is me on my Mithra costume, the same model as my RNG role model Ashiya.

And lastly, in true Winter tradition, I got ill. D: IRL, too! At least Mizuko looked after me when I got stuck in her bed. Ahem.

Sunday, 16 December 2007

So, because of University work nailing me down like a dead skunk, I've been unable to play since September! Recently, I was asked to come back. A lot of people missed me helping out the LS, so I decided to come back, grab WoG and start playing again, but this time, much more casually. Tons of stuff has changed in-game and IRL, but playing games for fun and when suits me best is better not only for my health, but for my attitude towards everything - including endgame.

Anyway, moving on - goodies! I was surprised about these, until I realized most stuff in the LS is now going FFA due to the amount of things they achieve.

Bahamut v2. He's one mean motherfucker. We had 3 Kraken DRKs and killed him in 20 seconds. Nobody wants Hose ever, so they FFA'd to my PUP, who can now kick! ...Yay? The battle looked a lot like this:

It was the most epileptic 20 seconds of my life. Afterwards, we had a few days off. So I decided to explore WoG. Considering I spent the first 3 hours of the expansion waiting in Garliage to get back to the Maw I so stupidly jumped off the cliff from, it's been good fun. The new areas mess with your head, since the layout of the levels is completely different. But the most messed up thing is soloing Colibri in E.Ronfaure. I mean what the hell. I love it. The missions are fun, the battles are epic, and the sense of being in the past is something I've always wanted to explore since I did the San D'Oria missions way back in 2005.

...Dancer! I'm slowly taking this to 37 purely as a subjob for PUP. My main goals and reasons are to put on dance shows for people with E100. It's always been a fucked up dream of mine, lol. I'm loving soloing with it right now, and on paper it will work so well with my PUP's H2H (And now kicking?) skills, getting tons of TP, and having E100 cure me aswell as casting Drain Samba. Greatest solo combination ever, let's hope it works in practice.

Recently I've been getting to know a few new LS members and people in general. One girl, Mizuko, has been hanging out with me a lot lately. Sazaku her boyfriend is really awesome, and they're both in the LS, so I can talk to them both at the same time! We got up to some shenanigans at a Bomb Queen run the other day:

Positron let me have his pop set as he needed +4 Inventory space desperately, and I needed the ring for my Kraken Build, (I'm now around 200 HP from the cap without Carbonara.) I'd like to go back and farm cores/ash again for Mizuko and Posi, to thank them for all their hard work. Here's some chat screenies:

lol, my pervy side. Oh how I miss you so. We've hung out numerous times, especially levelling DNC to 5 together, which resulted in many laughs and incredibly loud macros. Speaking of friends, I've been in touch with Ashiya who switched server a while back too. Seems she's also playing the game casually, which is great news, since I knew it was dragging her down near the end, so much so she had to transfer. I miss you Ashiya D: Your horrible PUP jokes and endless scorns were greatly appreciated!

That's all for now~ if I don't update again before Christmas, I hope everyone has a great winter break. See you in 2008~!

Sunday, 9 September 2007

I've become hooked on my darling little 'bo ChaosChariot. He recently grew into a teenager and a week later he stretched his big beautiful wings into this gorgeous creature:

Isn't he lovely? His stats currently include Impressive Strength and Better than Average Indurance. What a beast! I've been racing him, playing the Chocobo Hot and Cold game (2/4 La Thiene so far!) and taking great care of him. It's great that I can still ride him when he retires without having to look after him. Once I've capped his physical attributes, I'll work on teaching him stories to up his abilities. So much fun!

Since I'm working on a haste build, capped Desperate Blows was a must for my Last Resort effect and /SAM's Hasso. Muted Soul will help a fraction when I'm Krakenin' stuff, and Souleater recast is now the same as Last Resort at 5mins. Nice and tidy.

So returning back to CDC, we took down Omega in 5 mins. Literally. We got him to 20% so fast, we farmed for about 15 mins only to get 2 pods, before we got bored of spamming Stone I on the poor guy. There's a lots of drama and commotion over his legs, so I went the safe route, avoided it, and nabbed his eyeball.

It's replacing my W.Turban because I love MAcc, and it has lots of other gimmicks like Acc, DEF, just little things that really sell stuff to me when I look at a piece of armor in full perspective. I'll get more haste one day. One day!

Now onto the interesting stuff. The update that was released recently upgraded PUP to incredible strengths. It took around 4 or 5 days to complete the quests for each of the new WHM and BLM heads that work well with all existing frames (apart from, well, Sharpshot, obviously.) These heads provided the following new spells:

Tier IV nukes (Stone IV, Water IV, Aero IV, Fire IV, and if you have max merits like moi: Blizzard IV)Drain (Will only Drain living mobs)Aspir (Will only Aspir mobs with MP pool)Absorb-INT (Absorbs 20-19 INT every time, will only absorb from enemies with high INT)

I'm currently capped on magic, and sitting at 270/279 Melee and 250/269 Ranged. I fine it very hard to skill these up considering the only hard mobs I have the patience for are exp mobs such as Mamool or Trolls! And so far, I can reach these numbers with all the obvious BLM attachments (Ice Maker, Mana Channeller etc.):

The version fix tomorrow is also improving their base stats, and fixing their max HP and MP since this information was messed up in the update (Boo for 1.6k HP when I used to have 1.9k!)

So while skilling these up I managed to cap my evasion! On DRK it stops at 225, but on PUP it goes up to 260! It's REALLY at 250, but my Boxer's added an extra +10 Skill, hence capping it!
Oh ho ho ho ho!

I messed around with some of my furniture too. I got some new pieces here and there and just tried to make my Mog House look nice and warm. Wait a second, what's that ugly triangular flag on my wall?!

That's right! It's the final item from completing all the ToAU missions! Me, Nich, Deca, and a few others spammed our way through many attempts at this final fight, before taking down the big guy himself. The rewards were totally worth the 6 hours we spent retrying it! A spiffy title, amazing ring, pretty wall hanging, and my long lost Glory Crown! But the best reward was the memories, I'll never forget the pain we went through, haha. /wrists

And for now, that's all. I also want to make a mention toooo Dsab, Stac, Ubermonkey, and Decadence, who I met up with IRL for a day of hilarity in Stirling, may we have many more ridiculous adventures!

Tuesday, 31 July 2007

Well, it was one of those weekends. A weekend which I achieved so much stuff in-game, even if all I did IRL was eat cereal, sleep, and go to the toilet.

Man, isn't FFXI great?

First up, Assault! Out of nowhere I jumped from 3 Assaults into Rank 4 to this:

It must be due to all the Salvage I've been doing, heh. I helped my friend Phobe camp Joytoy also, even if it popped well after we both fell asleep. She got it though, and it all ended with smiles. The next day I helped them both get that damn Ilrusi Atoll staging point and we tried Golden Savage. Let's just say /SMN sub is a pretty bad idea, haha.

Completely my fault, and feeling a bit dumb for trying, I decided to help Nicholi, Tyrage, and Saam kill Gessho for the ToAU 34(35?) BCNM. Me and Slycer tried to duo it 3 times (No exp loss!) and failed miserably. Once everyone was logged on we took him down easily. After that, well, I won't spoil it... So have some screenies of Aphmau!

Next, here's a pic of the Timepiece I got after spending 100 days together with my new friend in Vana'diel! Next up: Miniature Airship after 365 days! WOO!

And lastly, ohhh how long I have waited to see this:

Finally, after waiting almost a year, these babies are mine. A big thank you again to CDC, but no body this time, our lucky streak is over. Thanks to me.

Tuesday, 24 July 2007

Well recently taking a break from the game, I came back to mainly have something to do during the weekends and get over the fact my best bro Fortei is leaving the game.

I've been hanging out in Europa an awful lot during GMT time, popping in for Salvage at 1pm on Sundays (omggmtevents :DDD) and messing around with missions.

I'm up the the last BCNM in ToAU, the CSs have been amazing so far, I'm in love with Nash...er..Aphmau, and her puppets!

As far as sea goes, we've been kicking some Faith's and Hope's around hoping and having faith in getting Torques, but none have dropped. Ironic.

I've also been a very busybody with merits and skilling up, capping my club at 220 (Putting it up to 8 merits also for Kraken) and completing PUP Tier 2, and 5/5 Melee frame. Next up is 5/5 Magic, capping Club, then maybe H2H or finishing DRK Tier 2. Long way to go.

So yes. Salvage. I go with Europa on Sundays because I have nothing else to do and I don't feel tired going to events at 1.30pm. I mainly go for experience to help CDC's Salvage runs, and to possibly master how the concept of it works like Slycer or Ryushii. It's real interesting, and me and Agrona have lead the last two CDC runs, both of which went VERY well.

1/3 Ares body! Positron, Sumazi, Kravin, Etterni, a lot of people have started the path to upgrading pieces and it can only get easier as more people learn how to pass cells faster. We already own at Sea, soon we'll own this event too!

Also, we had some fun with "The Don" on the 3rd floor of Silver Sea. It was a great laugh when Sasuun was the only one not to get charmed, ho ho ho.

Friday, 13 July 2007

After waiting in hope for almost a month now, constantly buying and selling and trading and haggling, I finally got one of my own. Credits please~!

A big thank you to:

Saam, for letting me borrow his Kraken to skillup and use until I got my own,Sumazi, for always trying to find new ways to get me one and keeping my spirits up,Kravin, for helping promote the Kraken fund on FFXIAH.com,Ashiya, for NOTHING after selling hers to that Tiz guy,Salsa, the JP Taru DRK who wouldn't sell it to anyone but another DRK,

...and to you, the person who started this whole quest. It's finally over, friend.

Monday, 18 June 2007

So, I was duoing in the Thickets with Kravin'sBLM and my PUP and we noticed that E100 can fight stuff and solo it pretty well when I'm half way across the map!

So we came up with the crazy idea that maybe I could take down two of those Brittle Rocks in Tier 1 Lebros Assault on PUP.

And it worked! We didn't have enough other DD to actually beat the thing, and I really hate any Tier 1 Assault, but I deployed E100 on one of the North walls and I ran to one of the East ones and started punching it. When he finished cutting away at his wall, he ran back to my side aggro free and helped take down the remaining walls.

It was an experience if any lol, each day I get bored in the game I find out something new. :p

Sky tonight. Kravin said most of the stuff is going FFA apart from Haidate. Which I don't need. I hope I can grab a pair of Kote from Seiryu at least, maybe some Crimson Gauntlets. Gonna be so glad when my RNG can wear them...!

Saturday, 16 June 2007

Now this is a story all about how my life got flipped, turned upside down. I'd like to take a minute just sit right there, I'll tell you how I became the prince of a capital called Aht Urhgan:

The Puppetmaster job quest was incredibly enjoyable. I loved it. Instantly upon unlocking, I bought some level 1 gear and headed out to Ronfaure to do some soloing with my brand new Automaton, E100.

Why the name E100? Inspired by the Sonic series' E-100 type robots, I was instantly drawn to the name. I hope one day E100 will also become sentient and develop feelings of love to everyone around him!

But first, down to brass tacks. After some friendly chit chat, me and E100 got down to work!

Rabbits. As always I hate this part of a new job. However, with E100 spamming Dia, cure, and leaving all the punching to me, it was more than bearable. It was, for once, fun! Once I hit level 10, I headed back to Nashmau to pick up all the Tier I Attachments. I was amazed at how much power I could control once I had them all equipped...

The first frame I upgraded was Valoredge. Using Strobe, Flashbulb and Shock Absorber, I didn't even bother with making a party in Valkurm or Qufim. Yes, me and E100 duo'd all the way through those areas, all the way to level 25 and beyond. I think I got one or two Kazham parties, but even then, I would spend most of my time in Buburimu, either eating Bomb Tosses, or soft white sand. Lovely.

At level 20, I unlocked the Sharpshop frame. I skilled up its Ranged skill on those pesky rabbits, and when it was 10 levels before the cap, I used it in exp parties. Alternating between the Valoredge frame in order to keep those two skills capped!

At level 30, I finally unlocked my Stormwaker frame. The original Harlequin now lacking in melee and magical skill, I rotated between the three upgraded frames on my journey to level 35. Beetles in Sauromugue gave amazing exp and skillups while soloing. We even made some new friends, well, before plucking their transparent wings and showering them with Blizzard!

Being able to solo right outside Jeuno while looking for a group was always impossible for me. Until the Deactivate-Activate-Deploy (DAD) trick was discovered among the PUP community. Deactivating an Automaton at full HP reset Activate's timer, allow you to reactivate your automaton again with full MP, resulting in limitless MP and zero downtime for cures, a trick I still use to this day!

Level 45. I remember how boring these levels were on DRK, On PUP though, that wasn't the case. however, with soloing becoming near impossible with the Valoredge frame, I decided to start making my own parties. From level 45 onwards, we journeyed through Altepa and explored the Quicksand Caves, making loads of new friends along the way. Once I hit level 50, it was time to take the job one step further...

With no Artifact Armour quests for any of the three new jobs, we had to slog it out in Auction House equipment in Kuftal and Boyada. These places were our home until level 57, when the exp got a little dry, and party invites started to drop like flies. Maybe it was finally time to take E100 back to his roots and move to the new areas in and around Aht Urhgan?

From 55-65, E100 and I slowly uncovered the mysterious Wajoam Woodlands. Colibri, Tigers, Crawlers, and even Trolls fell to our combined power! Nothing could stop us!

Achieving level 60 was a huge accomplishment. During this time, Puppetmaster AF was finally introduced! The equipment came bundled huge improvements on Job Specific abilities and a whole bunch of Automaton bonuses. Things were really started heating up!

Sadly, the community wasn't having any of it. PUP's lack of Hand to hand skill, STR equipment, and massive Martial Arts delay meant it was an awful job to bring to exp parties. But I never let that stop me. Other players didn't - and to this day, still don't - realise PUP's full potential as both a solo and party job!

Much like BST and DRG, one has to combine both Pet and master damage to see the full picture, and at level 70, that picture was a pretty one. With a plethora of new attachments, PUP was capable of soloing even the toughest of battlefields. Including the new ENM60 areas.

Don't get me wrong, on my first try, I failed miserably. But, practice makes perfect. Heck, I won easily and even got the new Drum Magazine attachment to drop on my third attempt!

Using PUP for events such as NM camping for Fortei, coffer key grabbing for LS members, or even just running errands, me and E100 were inseparable. To quote a certain Taru: "You look stupid as hell, but, that AF and your abilities are beginning to grow on me...".

Even convincing one other player PUP was a great job pushed me to get level 75 faster than ever before.

At 72, I came back to where it all began in Bastok, in order to test my skills by taking on the level 70 limit break battle. Since I beat Maat already on DRK, I didn't need to do this, but wanted to prove to myself that I, and E100, could!

With one win under my belt, the road to 75 was straight ahead. Burning one or two levels a day, and counting down the remaining days until my summer holidays were over, me and E100 travelled the world and took in all the beautiful sights Aht Urhgan had to offer; Caedavra Mire, Mamook, Halvung, heck, we even paid our good old friends Cerberus and Jaded Jody a little visit!

With Accuracy, Attack and STR gear now equippable, and the Target Marker attachment working overtime to raise E100's incredibly poor accuracy, me and my automaton were on fire. Every level taught me something new about each frame; Valoredge could pull, tank, and even stun TP moves with Shield Bash. Stormwaker kept me buffed and kept the enemies enfeebled, and Sharpshot made sure nothing lived longer than 15 seconds.

Heck, E100 could even land hits on mobs that even my DRK would miss, though that isn't saying much.

Before long, all our hard work paid off. Earlier today, I finally hit 75 and got myself Dragon Kick. All that's left is to cap all of E100's skills one last time, and upgrade him to his fullest potential with the newly introduced merits.

In a way, I'm pretty sad it's over. But you can't keep levelling forever, right? Sure you've reached the end, but at the end of the day, it's just a bunch of numbers. There's lots of more things for us to learn and experience, they journey has just begun!

In closing, I'm proud of myself for getting this job to 75 in such a short time, especially with all the negativity spiralling around it. people need to chill out. PUP is a fun job, and in a videogame, fun is all the matters.

...and we really had a lot of fun, didn't we, E100? Here's to the future, and beyond!

When Puppetmaster was released, I levelled it straight away. I had never levelled a pet job in any game before, and anything that revolves around robots is right up my alley! The main reason though, is because even to this day, I wanted to prove to the community that I could make PUP a versatile, enjoyable, and respected job, instead of the current laughing stock that it is.

An ongoing struggle if there ever was one!

Square Enix still has a little way to go before it can be considered a standard endgame job, but in any case, it's one of the most enjoyable experiences I've had in FFXI, and I'm going to keep on enjoying it!

I can be seen in the Woodlands, soloing Puks or Colibri most of the time, or in Limbus, if you can catch me I might even put on a small dance performance! My favourite frame for most everything is Valoredge. It's the one I've put maximum merits into, and was the first upgrade I got at level 10. Ain't he cute?

I play Puppetmaster by putting the Automaton first. Sacrificing myself to save him, knowing that when he has recovered he'll sort me out right away. Oh! Did I mention? His name is E100.

TP:

Weapon Skill:

/DRG?!:

It's funny writing up a list of different gear sets for an unpolished job. The rarity of Salvage gear makes the list totally incomplete, but with the gear I have, I still do my best to perform well out there on the battlefield.

Lacking a Faith Torque for TPing in, I reuse my DRK's Great Sword Thunder Gorget for the most of my PUP Weaponskills. If I ever get off my lazy butt, the P.Legs from Mamool Ja Assault will be worn full-time for their STR and Acc bonuses!

Recently, I got Dragoon sub up for PUP and DRK. However it really shines on PUP due to lack of good gear for a melee build like myself. /DRG gives: +10 Acc and +10 Att from Job Traits, +6 more Att from the Wyvern Mantle, and +5% Haste from the Wyvern Earring. Piled with Swift Belt and Walahra Turban, this gives lower H2H delay than /MNK or /WAR. You also get two jumps for quicker TP gain, extra damage, and for looking cool. Sorta.

Play Style & Subjobs:

/NIN /WAR /THF /DRG /WHM /BLM

I'm a melee build. With a strange Evasion obsession too. /WHM and /BLM are strictly for Warp and Besieged, never for anything else. I leave all the cures to E100 while I punch stuff. Simple!

When soloing - and I solo a lot - I usually pick /NIN for anything over Even Match, and /WAR for anything under it. /NIN gives shadows, without which I feel naked and exposed! /WAR is great for switching hate to and from my Automaton.

As I mentioned before, with most enemies under EM, I choose Valoredge Frame with Strobe, and bounce hate to and from me and E100 until the thing dies. If I'm in a pinch, I pop an Oil+2 and swap E100's HP with mine, then let him recover with the Oil still active. Cannibal Blade hits for 300+ every time, giving him a nice chunk of HP back also.

With /NIN, I have StormBody and ValorHead as a curebot for quick Cure 4s on demand. Knockout also deals a fair amount of damage, and can Skillchain with anything I do. This setup works great in Boyada Tree against Steelshells, especially now with Replicator and the new Merits.

My sub of choice is definitely /DRG. I use it at events and when I'm in exp parties. Jumps, a ton of good traits, and Latent Gear all improves PUP's performance in exp, even if everyone focuses on lil' E100!

Long time player, first time blogger. I thought it would be good idea to keep my Final Fantasy XI memories separate from my personal Livejournal ones, so here they are!

Let me introduce myself. I'm Jkun from Fenrir. I main both Dark Knight and Puppetmaster.

My history and life in FFXI has spanned over three very eventful years so far, with each year creating more and more memories of a world I have grown to love.

If you are an avid player of Final Fantasy XI, please enjoy reading about everything I will get up to from now on. If not, why not give it a try?

Okay! Let's begin! My current linkshell, CoolDudesChillin' was founded in September last year by Sumazi and Sath, two really good friends of mine. It was at this time I had just finished getting Puppetmaster to 75, and CDC were hiring. Focused on sea, our little group of rapscallions expanded to tackling Sky, HNM, Limbus and more. Before we knew it, we had quite a reputation.

Since those golden days, a lot of things have changed. My best friend Fortei left the game to get on with his life, and now Sumazi and I quietly run CDC, trying out best to keep the Linkshell alive and kicking.

Now that the brief history session is over, let's finally talk about my character!

Dark Knight

The first job I grew attached to after 30 was Dark Knight. This job made its way to 75 where it became my main and the job I'm most skilled at using. It's faced off against monsters in CoP and Zilart, Dynamis, Limbus, Einherjar, Assault...the list goes on! The most memorable moments I've experienced on Dark Knight weren't achieved just by myself. leveling it to 75 and meeting a lot of friends on the way was the best time of my FFXI life so far.

The second best? Probably the time my very first endgame linkshell tried so hard to defeat Cerberus before allowing me to have me the beautiful Algol great sword, or the time my Social/Dynamis linkshell worked so hard to help fund my Relic Scythe, which is still a long way away from completion!

Speaking of which, Scythe is my current choice of weapon (sorry Algol!) for Darkn Knight, and I'm currently working hard on creating the perfect Haste setup. A few more pieces of Homam should fix that! Currently, here's short introduction to the gear I use during exp, minus my traditional Yagudo Hat!:

TP:

Weapon Skill:

Dark Magic:

I honestly don't know many people that wear Plastron over Hauberk or Hauberk+1 for WS. I wear it because of the added STR and Attack, and because when running around sea or to and from Merit camps I can flip a macro button and regen some MP while I'm on the move. At full HP I combine this tactic with my Parade Gorget and it's all systems go!

One or two items are still needed to pimp my Dark Magic setup out a bit more, like a certain Sea cape and Blood Gauntlets, but what I have works pretty well on anything. My drain 2's sit at 300+, with 400+ on Magic Bursts that I usually find myself closing!

Play Style & Subjobs:

/NIN /WAR /THF /DRG /SAM /WHM /BLM

When I was growing up, I was told to never, ever break a skillchain. Back in the days when Bibiki Bay and Sky were the best 75 exp camps, I did nothing but Skillchains, and I still abide by that rule. When it comes to HNM or Jailers, /THF is my subjob, and closing Darkness is my forte(i). In exp parties, Limbus, or on jailer of Faith, it has to be /NIN. When soloing? /NIN. Oh shit, some dude needs LB1? /NIN. I can't stress how useful a subjob NIN is. Especially when you pull a ton of hate, and Spikes, Drain and Drain 2 are down. Utsusemi really does save your ass!

I took DRG to 37 in order to use the Wyvern Earring, an extra +5% Haste in my never ending journey to reach the haste cap, plus, who could resist jumps? More TP, more damage!

However, with a good tank, I'll go /WAR and watch those Weaponskill numbers fly! /SAM is also incredible for damage dealing, right up there with /WAR due to Hasso and Seigan, and recently, new 2 handed weapon strength buffs!

Never forget, DRK is all about damage, yo!

Thanks for reading! I hope we can make many, many more memories from here on!